Presidio of San Francisco

A military post continuously held by three different nations for over two centuries, the Presidio is now one of America's boldest experiments in park management — a national park required by law to pay for itself.

Spanish colonists established the Presidio in 1776 as part of Juan Bautista de Anza's overland expedition, with Jose Joaquin Moraga formally founding the fort to guard the entrance to San Francisco Bay. It changed hands without ever losing its military purpose: Mexico inherited it after independence from Spain in 1821, and the United States occupied it in 1846 during the Mexican-American War, formally cementing its role as a permanent American Army post two decades later.

For nearly 150 years the Presidio served as an active U.S. Army post, at times headquartering the Sixth Army and garrisoning troops including Buffalo Soldiers of the 24th Infantry. Its Letterman Army Hospital treated soldiers through multiple wars, and its 1,500 acres came to include a planted forest, coastal bluffs, and Crissy Field, a military airfield built along the bay.

A 1989 federal base-closure law marked the Presidio for closure, and the Army departed in 1994, transferring the post to the National Park Service as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. In 1996, Congress created the Presidio Trust to manage the site under an unusual mandate: unlike any other unit of the National Park System, the Presidio is required to fund its own operations through leased historic buildings and commercial tenants, including George Lucas's Lucasfilm, which built its headquarters on the former hospital site, and the restored tidal marsh of Crissy Field.